Fighter vs Barbarian question

[Cetus]

As shown by my Fighter build you can get rid of that advantage to a large extent by using the massive amount of feats Fighters get to pick up multiple chains.

I'm not calling that build ineffective, but I'd prefer not to ever make a build that way largely because the extra bludgeon feats you take are pointless. I'll explain.

1. You grabbed WF:blunt, wasted feat for +1 to hit when the epic wiz king himself only has low 60's ac. I have hit the wiz king on a 2 with a maul without having any ap or feats toward blunt weapons. Especially with the to-hit numbers you claim to have in that thread, you should be hitting him on a 2 while TWF as well if that was your preferred weapon style.

2. The only time I see you actually making use of your 3 TWF feats and grab two weapons is for autocritical trash. Wasting 3 feats to kill already autocritical trash quicker cannot be justified by myself or anyone else when you are clearly admitting that the THF aspects of that build yield greater dps against bosses or non-autocritical trash.

3. You also acquire WS:bludgeon, +2 dmg for the time you are using a bludgeon weapon, I imagine perhaps when fighting the wiz king is also something I wouldn't be able to justify.

When you choose the fighter class at creation, you do that knowing that their time to shine is with their signature weapon. Adding a completely useless +1 to hit from a feat to a weapon that you will use so infrequently you won't even notice it; with another +2 dmg/hit feat is pointless. The barbarian is much more consistent at delivering high dps to bludgeon targets even with the WS bludgeon feat- its 2 dmg.

I quote:

"A Fighter can take both TWF and THF to maximise not only single target DPS..."

Well, in that case, I don't see Greater weapon specializations: bludgeon in that feat list either, you already aren't maximizing your single target dps under "all circumstances."

For all practical puposes, although the idea has some value, the build won't function very well in my opinion. You don't have feat room for even the pally past life if you were to choose to acquire one.

[sacredguyver]

Thanks everyone for the rather lively discussion, it's just what I was looking for when I started this thread.

Currently I have made a WF THF Barbarian to play and will play it to my self-imposed cap of level 13. If by then I no longer enjoy playing the Barbarian, it (because WF have no actual gender) will be deleted and I'll play a Fighter to that level.

Before anyone asks why not both, I have only 4 character slots (being "premium"), the 3 others being used for my monk, wizard, and bard.

Thanks again for all the input.

[Consumer]

I'm not calling that build ineffective, but I'd prefer not to ever make a build that way largely because the extra bludgeon feats you take are pointless. I'll explain.

1. You grabbed WF:blunt, wasted feat for +1 to hit when the epic wiz king himself only has low 60's ac. I have hit the wiz king on a 2 with a maul without having any ap or feats toward blunt weapons. Especially with the to-hit numbers you claim to have in that thread, you should be hitting him on a 2 while TWF as well if that was your preferred weapon style.

It is a pre req for WS: Blunt. This benefits not only your beloved Wiz king on a 2 example, it also benefits offhand stunning weapons, elite Abbot e.c.t.

2. The only time I see you actually making use of your 3 TWF feats and grab two weapons is for autocritical trash. Wasting 3 feats to kill already autocritical trash quicker cannot be justified by myself or anyone else when you are clearly admitting that the THF aspects of that build yield greater dps against bosses or non-autocritical trash.

What % of epic runs do you spend killing epic trash compared to bosses?

When you choose the fighter class at creation, you do that knowing that their time to shine is with their signature weapon. Adding a completely useless +1 to hit from a feat to a weapon that you will use so infrequently you won't even notice it; with another +2 dmg/hit feat is pointless. The barbarian is much more consistent at delivering high dps to bludgeon targets even with the WS bludgeon feat- its 2 dmg.

The Barb has a 5% DPS advantage against 100% fort with a min II maul. Clearly much more consistent lol.

I quote:

"A Fighter can take both TWF and THF to maximise not only single target DPS..."

Well, in that case, I don't see Greater weapon specializations: bludgeon in that feat list either, you already aren't maximizing your single target dps under "all circumstances."

As you should know you have to make compromises when choices are limited. Oh wait, you just stacked up on HP lol. Do you actually need most of that HP in the majority of content, I would think not.

If you want to talk about pointless feats why not talk about the massive amount of HP and toughness feats you love to boast about whenever Fighters are brought up.

For all practical puposes, although the idea has some value, the build won't function very well in my opinion. You don't have feat room for even the pally past life if you were to choose to acquire one.

It's good to know then that I don't give a ****ing flying jam sandwich about your opinion.

It is currently and will continue to function very well without being a HP *****.

[Aaxeyu]

The Barb has a 5% DPS advantage against 100% fort with a min II maul. Clearly much more consistent lol.

Indeed, people often tend to forget that a huge part of barbs DPS comes from the +3 to crit multiplier.

[Consumer]

Indeed, people often tend to forget that a huge part of barbs DPS comes from the +3 to crit multiplier.

That and the fact that they have lower to hit in a lot of situations, have to drop hundreds of HP when rage is finished or cancelled, cannot balance clicky timers as easily as Fighters e.c.t.

[Cetus]

It is a pre req for WS: Blunt. This benefits not only your beloved Wiz king on a 2 example, it also benefits offhand stunning weapons, elite Abbot e.c.t.



What % of epic runs do you spend killing epic trash compared to bosses?



The Barb has a 5% DPS advantage against 100% fort with a min II maul. Clearly much more consistent lol.



As you should know you have to make compromises when choices are limited. Oh wait, you just stacked up on HP lol. Do you actually need most of that HP in the majority of content, I would think not.

If you want to talk about pointless feats why not talk about the massive amount of HP and toughness feats you love to boast about whenever Fighters are brought up.



It's good to know then that I don't give a ****ing flying jam sandwich about your opinion.

It is currently and will continue to function very well without being a HP *****.

It benefits offhand stunning weapons....when you're claiming to be able to reach a low 70's to hit...

elite abbot? you're arguments are losing more credibility as you fish for reasons.

hmm...considering how quick you refer to insults to defend your broken build, you probably have even less patience to wait to kill a held epic mob with an epic sos than you do to switch to TWF. Lets spend 3 feats for just THAT.

Sure, you have to make compromises- but taking 2dmg on blunt weapons as a feat with your "useless" pre req feat is a loss, not a compromise.

I never once "boasted" about hp- however I did advocate its importance when holding aggro of epic mobs that hit pretty dang hard. And with the amount of dps a properly built and geared fighter can deliver, you WILL have aggro a good % of the time.

Cheers.

Cet

[Consumer]

It benefits offhand stunning weapons....when you're claiming to be able to reach a low 70's to hit...

elite abbot? you're arguments are losing more credibility as you fish for reasons.

hmm...considering how quick you refer to insults to defend your broken build, you probably have even less patience to wait to kill a held epic mob with an epic sos than you do to switch to TWF. Lets spend 3 feats for just THAT.

Sure, you have to make compromises- but taking 2dmg on blunt weapons as a feat with your "useless" pre req feat is a loss, not a compromise.

I never once "boasted" about hp- however I did advocate its importance when holding aggro of epic mobs that hit pretty dang hard. And with the amount of dps a properly built and geared fighter can deliver, you WILL have aggro a good % of the time.

Cheers.

Cet

I guessed you would avoid my questions so again:

What % of epic runs do you spend killing epic trash compared to bosses?

Do you actually need most of that HP in the majority of content?

Now focus on the questions, do not focus around the questions, focus on the questions.

[PopeJual]

Do you actually need most of that HP in the majority of content?

Do you *need* high HP in order to complete the majority of quests? No.

Is it helpful? Yes.

Does it make many quests easier and put less stress on the healer? Yes.

Can it keep a party on the path to success instead of leading to a party wipe? Have you been in a ToD? Of course it does.

But do you *need* most of those HP in the majority of content? Of course not. You can stay at the entrance and pike. You can ride in someone's backpack. You can make your way through most Epic content with 200 HP and pick up an occasional Epic token. It's just not a good idea when more HP are so easy to acquire.

[Consumer]

Do you *need* high HP in order to complete the majority of quests? No.

Is it helpful? Yes.

Does it make many quests easier and put less stress on the healer? Yes.

Can it keep a party on the path to success instead of leading to a party wipe? Have you been in a ToD? Of course it does.

But do you *need* most of those HP in the majority of content? Of course not. You can stay at the entrance and pike. You can ride in someone's backpack. You can make your way through most Epic content with 200 HP and pick up an occasional Epic token. It's just not a good idea when more HP are so easy to acquire.

Why don't you answer the question I put to you earlier instead of ignoring it.

Why are they pointless?

[PopeJual]

Why don't you answer the question I put to you earlier instead of ignoring it.

Why are they pointless?

No. I will answer the question (especially since you clarified it). I just haven't gotten around to it yet.

I have a full list of feats to go through and I do think that taking 7 Toughness feats is overkill, so you can be a little patient while I browse through the list.

Honestly, I think that even taking Skill Focus: UMD is a better option than taking Weapon Focus: Bludgeoning, Weapon Specialization: Bludgeoning and the full line of both THF and TWF feats.

[Consumer]

No. I will answer the question (especially since you clarified it). I just haven't gotten around to it yet.

I have a full list of feats to go through and I do think that taking 7 Toughness feats is overkill, so you can be a little patient while I browse through the list.

Honestly, I think that even taking Skill Focus: UMD is a better option than taking Weapon Focus: Bludgeoning, Weapon Specialization: Bludgeoning and the full line of both THF and TWF feats.

That's 1 feat and you've had a day to work it out.

[Cetus]

I guessed you would avoid my questions so again:

What % of epic runs do you spend killing epic trash compared to bosses?

Do you actually need most of that HP in the majority of content?

Now focus on the questions, do not focus around the questions, focus on the questions.

Your questions are vague, there are two variables to which I can tie my answer to- time spent, and amount of monsters killed. Each of which you can take a percentage and call it "spent on trash."

So, I'll gladly answer: the amount of monsters killed in a given epic run that are solely trash: the percentage is rather high.

The amount of time in a given epic quest spent killing trash, that percentage is way lower.

EDQ? That build fails.
TOD? the whole dang raid is bosses. The build fails.
Velah? see above
Chronoscope? Got more trash here, still majority of TIME is spent killing named- then cleanup.
VOD? couple trash spawns- named orthons and suulu is the main focus.
elite abbot? mostly caster dps anyway- your contribution is insignificant with your whopping +2dmg/ Good luck with surviving a disintegrate.
Epic Last stand? Epic deeps? Epic claw? Got 10 minute last stand completions, 20 minute deeps completions- you can go ahead and waste 3 feats on TWF trash in those quests. You will be less effective main tanking the named hezrou and you know it.
Epic wiz king- Again, his AoE's deal enough damage that hitpoints are desireable on a tank. Your two wasted feats on doing 2 extra dmg a hit on him is dumb, his AC is in the low sixties- perhaps you'd need all the help you can get- I haven't had a problem.

Do I actually need a mid 700's unbuffed hp bar on my kensai? absolutely.

He's built to deliver dmg and he's built to hold aggro. I don't tailgate the caster, I don't scream for a healer, I don't expect to die when holding aggro.

You fail a save or two on a chain lightning and a horrid wilting on the wiz king, or a disintegrate from an abbot, and you're fighters six feet under.

But hey, you wanna kill 3 extra feats for the TWF chain, and then 2 more feats for a +1 blunt to-hit and +2 damage for all the undead out there- go ahead man.

You seemed confused in that build post and I'm just trying to clear some stuff up for ya, no need to get hostile. If you don't care what anyone else thinks, then why should anyone care what you think? Afterall, you do provide quite a bit of input on these boards.


Cheers,

Cet

[Consumer]

So, I'll gladly answer: the amount of monsters killed in a given epic run that are solely trash: the percentage is rather high.

The amount of time in a given epic quest spent killing trash, that percentage is way lower.

EDQ? That build fails.
TOD? the whole dang raid is bosses. The build fails.
Velah? see above
Chronoscope? Got more trash here, still majority of TIME is spent killing named- then cleanup.
VOD? couple trash spawns- named orthons and suulu is the main focus.
elite abbot? mostly caster dps anyway- your contribution is insignificant with your whopping +2dmg/ Good luck with surviving a disintegrate.
Epic Last stand? Epic deeps? Epic claw? Got 10 minute last stand completions, 20 minute deeps completions- you can go ahead and waste 3 feats on TWF trash in those quests. You will be less effective main tanking the named hezrou and you know it.
Epic wiz king- Again, his AoE's deal enough damage that hitpoints are desireable on a tank. Your two wasted feats on doing 2 extra dmg a hit on him is dumb, his AC is in the low sixties- perhaps you'd need all the help you can get- I haven't had a problem.

Answer the questions, don't skirt around the questions are clear:

What % of epic runs do you spend killing epic trash compared to bosses?

Do you actually need most of that HP in the majority of content?



Tod, not epic, max slashing DPS, the build has very little problems, already discussed in the original thread.

VoD, not epic, can tank with 400 HP on elite with no problems, build has max DPS against Suulo and orthons, can TWF with vorpals for Devils, can use a two handed weapon to kill bats when Suulos on his pillar.

Elite abbot DC 28, fort save buffs well above 30. Not an epic quest.

You seemed confused in that build post and I'm just trying to clear some stuff up for ya, no need to get hostile. If you don't care what anyone else thinks, then why should anyone care what you think? Afterall, you do provide quite a bit of input on these boards.

Why should I adapt to your tank focused play style, DPS and tanking are two different things. I do not care what you think, we have different play styles and attitudes to posting. I do like to get input from other posters though.

Notice there I answered your question, try doing the same in return.

[Cetus]

Answer the questions, don't skirt around the questions are clear:

What % of epic runs do you spend killing epic trash compared to bosses?

Do you actually need most of that HP in the majority of content?



Tod, not epic, max slashing DPS, the build has very little problems, already discussed in the original thread.

VoD, not epic, can tank with 400 HP on elite with no problems, build has max DPS against Suulo and orthons, can TWF with vorpals for Devils, can use a two handed weapon to kill bats when Suulos on his pillar.

Elite abbot DC 28, fort save buffs well above 30. Not an epic quest.





Why should I adapt to your tank focused play style, DPS and tanking are two different things. I do not care what you think, we have different play styles and attitudes to posting. I do like to get input from other posters though.

Notice there I answered your question, try doing the same in return.

vorpal- lol.

You rock


to the OP: both builds are lots of fun to play if melee'ing is your thing- I'd recommend sticking to your current decision for now, getting a feel for what you can do with the class and then maybe try the alternative for a more objective feel for the class differences. Good luck, and have fun.

[PopeJual]

That's 1 feat and you've had a day to work it out.

I've had less than an hour to work it out - I've been busy with other things.

Zippo ain't gonna respond to himself, after all.

[PopeJual]

Answer the questions, don't skirt around the questions are clear:

What % of epic runs do you spend killing epic trash compared to bosses?

Clarification needed: Are you asking what percentage of time is spent killing epic trash compared to bosses? Or are you asking what percentage of effort and risk is spent killing epic trash compared to bosses?

There is a difference.

[Vanshilar]

Vague lol, a 5% difference is about that between my 18/1/1 build and my 20 Fighter build. The THF Barbs DPS will be much lower, 10% on an 18/2 Barb/Fighter.

More important than the ability to plug numbers into a spreadsheet and read out the numbers is the ability to understand where the numbers come from, analyze what they mean, and synthesize results and implications from those calculations. The OP wasn't asking about specific numbers, so I didn't bother pasting them, but the 5% figure was to give a numerical idea of how little the difference is. If you're calling it vague because I didn't post the full-blown calculations, I fail to see how you've been any less vague with your 5% and 10% numbers.

I'm pretty sure you've downloaded A-O's calc so I would be interested to see where the differences arise. If you could post the DPS calc you did for this comparison I would be grateful.

It's not necessary to appeal to a DPS calc for the numbers as if it were some oracle from on high. Anyone who uses and posts results from one should be able to understand how the calculations work and be able to go through it rather than treating it as some mysterious black box. The numbers are sufficiently simple enough to calculate for anyone that takes the time to understand the game mechanics.

For example, let's assume a fairly well-equipped pure fighter and pure barbarian. By fairly well-equipped I mean that they have a good amount of gear but not necessarily the best epic stuff possible. The one thing that I will assume both have is the Epic Sword of Shadow, although having that assumes the OP is able to do epic VoN 6 regularly (however, if the OP is going THF, it is definitely an item that you want on your wish list). Otherwise, the relatively modest assumptions are:

Equipment list:
+3 str tome
Tharne's Goggles (sneak attack damage +8)
Bloodstone (+6 seeker damage for crits)
Madstone Boots (+2 str, assume single since a double can only last for 2 minutes)
Shintao set (+2 base damage), Tower of Despair ring/necklace set
Ravager set (2d6 additional damage), Tower of Despair ring/belt set
Epic Sword of Shadow (5d6 base damage dice, +10 enhancement bonus, x3 crit multiplier, 15-20 critical range with improved critical: slash) with force ritual

I will also assume +8 base damage from bard songs, although whether or not those are always around in a raid is questionable. However, the point is that this isn't necessarily a "max DPS" build where the OP has spent six months to a year grinding out the perfect gear for, but a build where the gear is fairly easy to acquire (other than the eSoS which depends on the OP's luck) after a month or two if the OP does end-game raiding regularly. So I'm ignoring things like the epic marilith chain, which undoubtedly does increase both builds' DPS, but where the scroll is so rare to obtain that several months' grinding by Orien's most powergamer guild has so far been unfruitful and thus far the going rate for anyone on the entire server who finds one currently stands at a +3 greater heart of wood, metalline of pure good handwraps, 3 million plat, one of each +2 tome, and 5 of each large Shroud ingredient, among other things, and still no takers after nearly a month. However, such items are frequent staples of "max DPS" builds as if they fall from the sky like manna, and so lead to unrealistic expectations of what the general player will actually be able to get their hands on, not to mention sorely inflated DPS numbers. Ultimately though for DPS, gear basically increases the strength (leading to increased base damage via the strength modifier), the base damage (which gets multiplied by crits and is factored into glancing blows), or additional damage (which does not get multiplied by crits and procs on glancing blows fairly rarely), so you can tune your character on those variables based on where you think you're at, whether badly equipped or well-equipped.

For both fighters and barbarians, the strength breakdown is:
18 initial base strength
5 level-ups
3 tome
11 from equipment (6 enhancement, 2 exceptional from ToD ring, 1 exceptional from ToD ring, and 2 from single madstone)
2 rage (spell)
---
39 strength

From there, the fighter would get 3 additional strength from enhancements, and 8 from kensei power surge, for a total of 50. The barbarian would get 12 from rage (including 4 from the power rage enhancement line), 4 from death frenzy, and 2 from frenzy, for a total of 59. The THF strength damage modifier is 1.5x the usual modifier of (strength - 10)/2 rounded down, so for the fighter, the strength damage modifier would be 30, and for the barbarian, it would be 36.


Main hit damage for fighter:
Moving on, the base damage (with the Epic Sword of Shadow) for the fighter would be:
17.5 weapon damage dice of 5d6
10 weapon enhancement bonus
30 strength damage modifier
16 power attack
8 bard song
2 Shintao set
10 fighter feats/enhancements (4 from the kensei enhancement series, 2 from fighter <weapon> enhancement series, 4 from weapon spec feats)
---
93.5 base damage

When crits are involved, the base critical damage is:
93.5 base damage
6 bloodstone
8 fighter kensei enhancements
---
107.5 base critical damage

Across 20 rolls (i.e. rolling one face of each of the d20 die that DDO uses for combat among other things) for the main hit on a target with no fortification and assuming a hit on a roll of 2 or above, for the fighter using eSoS, on rolls 2-13 (12 rolls) he will do the base damage, and on rolls 14-20 (7 rolls) he will do the base critical damage x3. Therefore the average damage is:

(1*0 + 12*93.5 + 7*107.5*3) = 168.975

Now you add the damage that isn't multiplied, but proc on hits:
8 sneak attack damage (from Tharne's Goggles)
1 force ritual
6.5 Ravager's set
---
15.5 additional damage

=> 168.975 + 0.95 * 15.5 = 183.7 damage

A pure fighter who takes the capstone has a 10% chance of doublestrike, which basically means a 10% chance of getting two of these hits per swing rather than one, so:

average main hit damage = 183.7 * 1.1 = 202.07 damage per swing

Glancing blow damage for fighter:
Now for glancing blows. Glancing blows are hits which damage those near the character (including the main target), and come out automatically for a THF build. They will come out on the 1st and 4th attack animations when standing still (which I call "auto-attacking" since you just stand there with auto-attack on), and the 3rd attack animation when standing still if the character has picked up the Greater Two Handed Fighting feat. This is unchanged from Update 5 or Update 7. However, since Update 5, moving attacks no longer get glancing blows, which means that twitching does not have any glancing blow damage. Nevertheless, assume that both the fighter and the barbarian has invested in the full line of THF feats. Since Update 7, the formula for glancing blow damage has been:

base damage * (0.2 + 0.1 per THF feat + 0.1 if barbarian capstone)

Glancing blows do not proc sneak attack damage, and they do not crit. They also have their own to-hit roll and thus will miss on a roll of 1. However, they do occasionally proc additional damage (the "additional damage" part above), which I also call "magical damage" even if it's not magical. The amount is 3% chance per THF feat, plus 2% chance per prestige enhancement (kensei or frenzied berserker) tier, plus 5% for the barbarian capstone. You can see that this is a rather small amount of damage. Although the OP mentioned warforged, I will assume that he is not taking the warforged great weapon aptitude line of enhancements, since getting a 6% additional chance of proc on glancing blows amounts to around a 0.1% increase in DPS, and I assume the OP can find a better use for its cost of 6 AP.

Anyway, so the magical damage on a glancing blow is:
(magical damage) * (proc rate)
= (1 + 6.5) * (0.15)
= 1.125

So the average damage on a glancing blow (that successfully hit) is:
46.75 base damage * 0.5
1.125
-----
47.875 glancing blow damage (on a successful hit)

Overall damage per swing for fighter:
As mentioned previously, when twitching, there are no glancing blows. Therefore, the damage is exclusively from the main hits. When the fighter is auto-attacking, however, he will also do glancing blow damage. With the full line of GTHF, 3 out of the 4 animations (1st, 3rd and 4th) will have glancing blows, plus glancing blows miss on a 1 (so only 95% chance of hitting). Therefore, the damage that the fighter will do when auto-attacking is:

fighter auto-attack damage per swing = 202.07 + 0.75 * 0.95 * 47.875
=> fighter auto-attack damage per swing = 236.18 damage per swing

fighter twitch damage per swing = 202.07 damage per swing


Main hit damage for barbarian:
Now let's look at the barbarian's damage. Doing the same process as with the fighter but omitting the descriptions, the main hit's damage would be:
17.5 weapon damage dice of 5d6
10 weapon enhancement bonus
36 strength damage modifier
22 power attack (note 6 more than fighter due to barbarian enhancements)
8 bard song
2 Shintao set
---
95.5 base damage

When there are crits, it would be:
95.5 base damage
6 bloodstone
---
101.5 base critical damage

Across 20 rolls, the barbarian would get 3x crits on rolls of 15-18 (4 rolls), and 6x crits on rolls of 19-20 (2 rolls) due to FB 2, FB 3, and death frenzy effects. Therefore, the average damage is:

(1*0 + 13*95.5 + 4*101.5*3 + 2*101.5*6)/20 = 183.875

For magical damage (additional damage), the barbarian has frenzy which is 2d6 per hit, and death frenzy which is 4d6 per hit, so:
8 sneak attack damage (from Tharne's Goggles)
1 force ritual
6.5 Ravager's set
7 frenzy
14 death frenzy
---
36.5 additional damage

=> 183.875 + 0.95 * 36.5 = 218.55

=> average main hit damage = 218.55 damage per swing

Glancing blow damage for barbarian:
Unlike other types of additional damage, the frenzy and death frenzy effects of a barbarian proc on all glancing blows (other similar effects like vicious still behave normally, subject to the magical proc rate roll). The developers have stated that this is an (unfixed) bug; however, they may drag their feet a bit to fix this because they're likely aware that this bug amounts to around 4-5% of a barbarian's total DPS and would put barbarians somewhat behind on DPS if fixed. A barbarian also receives 10% more damage on their glancing blows from the capstone. Therefore, the damage for glancing blows is:

57.3 base damage * 0.6
1.5 magical damage (note that the proc rate is 0.2 due to barbarian capstone)
7 frenzy
14 death frenzy
---
79.8 glancing blow damage (on a successful hit)


Overall damage per swing for barbarian:
Similar to the fighter, in terms of doing the calculations:

barbarian auto-attack damage per swing = 218.55 + 0.75 * 0.95 * 79.8
=> barbarian auto-attack damage per swing = 275.4 damage per swing

barbarian twitch damage per swing = 218.55 damage per swing


Attack speeds
By attack speeds I'm referring to how long it takes each character to make a swing. I assume that both characters are hasted (which will almost always be the case in a raid situation). For the barbarian, every minute, he spends 2.4 seconds activating frenzy and death frenzy (with each taking 1.2 seconds to activate), so he is swinging a weapon 57.6 seconds out of every minute. Based on my attack speeds thread here, noting that the eSoS is in the "slowTHF" category, the barbarian will be swinging at 99.1 swings per second if auto-attacking and 119.5 swings per second if twitching during those 57.6 seconds. So out of every minute, the number of swings he gets is:

barbarian auto-attack swings per minute: 95.16 swings per minute

barbarian twitch swings per minute: 114.77 swings per minute

For the fighter, I assume he has quickdraw, which has a hidden effect in halving the activation times. So a fighter spends 0.6 seconds every 30 seconds activating haste boost (haste boost 4). Since the time of the latter activations count against the 20 seconds that haste boost is active, the fighter spends 19.4 seconds in a haste boost active state, and 10 seconds in a no-haste boost state, every 30 seconds (the remaining 0.6 seconds is when he is standing there activating his haste boost). A fighter will also spend 0.6 seconds every minute activating his kensei power surge. So out of every 60 seconds, the fighter will spend 19.4 * 2 = 38.8 seconds in a haste boost state, and 10 + 10 - 0.6 = 19.4 seconds in a non-haste boost state. The overall number of swings per minute is therefore:

38.8 * 124.1 / 60 + 19.4 * 99.1 /60 = 112.31 swings per minute
=> fighter auto-attack swings per minute: 112.31 swings per minute

38.8 * 154.2 / 60 + 19.4 * 124.1 /60 = 112.31 swings per minute
=> fighter twitch swings per minute: 138.38 swings per minute


Overall DPS with eSoS against 0% fort:
Based on the above, it is straightforward to calculate their DPS, as in the table below:

Ravager set, +3 str tome, eSoS, versus 0% fort and 0 DR
Class used (pure)	fighter	fighter	barb	barb
Style of attack used	twitch	autoatt	twitch	autoatt
main hit damage/swing	202.07	202.07	218.55	218.55
glancing damage/swing	0	34.11	0	56.86
total damage per swing	202.07	236.18	218.55	275.41
swings per minute	138.38	112.31	114.77	95.16
damage per second	466.03	442.09	418.04	436.79

In looking the table, you can see that the fighter (twitch) will have higher DPS than the barb (auto-attack) by about 6.7%. Those are the optimal styles for each of the classes. You can also see what I said before -- that a fighter will (largely) lose his DPS advantage ahead of the barbarian if he doesn't twitch, and the calculations assume perfect twitch with haste boost 4 active, with it inactive (during the cooldown), and in timing twitch correctly in the transition when the boost wears off. You can also see that a fighter's damage per swing is fairly low compared to a barbarian's, and that the DPS advantage that a fighter has is due to the high rate of attacks (swings). Each swing of a fighter (twitch) only does 73.4% of the damage of a barbarian (auto-attack), but fighters (twitch) get 45.4% more swings off during the same time (over the course of a minute), leading to their higher DPS. Note also that twitch results in faster attack speed (swings per minute) but less damage per swing, due to not getting glancing blows on 3/4 of the swings. For a fighter, since glancing blows are a relatively minor part of the damage (making up around 1/7 of the damage), it is better to twitch, since they will get 23% more attacks. However, because of the frenzy/death frenzy damage on glancing blows, glancing blows make up over 1/5 of the damage for a barbarian, so a 21% increase in attack speed (i.e. around 1/6 more attacks in the same time frame) is not worthwhile, and so it's better to auto-attack.

So why did I say that a fighter has around 5% more DPS than a barbarian? Well, it's because these calculations somewhat benefited fighters, since the strength calculations had them ending on an even strength score (compared to an odd one for the barbarian), and barbarians generally use the frenzied berserker set for ToD instead. If we now assume that both have grinded a bit more and have gotten +4 str tomes from ToD, and that both are using the FB set instead, then the same calculations would be:

FB set, +4 str tome, eSos, versus 0% fort and 0 DR
Class used (pure)	fighter	fighter	barb	barb
Style of attack used	twitch	autoatt	twitch	autoatt
main hit damage/swing	198.91	198.91	221.63	221.63
glancing damage/swing	0	34.13	0	58.07
damage per swing	198.91	233.04	221.63	279.69
swings per minute	138.38	112.31	114.77	95.16
damage per second	458.73	436.20	423.92	443.59

You can see that by getting a +4 strength tome and using the FB set instead of the ravager set, the barbarian has increased his strength from 59 to 62, resulting in a DPS increase (despite losing the ravager damage) of around 6.8 DPS, meaning that now, the fighter (still using the ravager set since it's more advantageous to him) has a DPS advantage over the barbarian of 5.1%.

Or if we assume that the character has been unlucky with tomes and so both only have +2 strength tomes (which are fairly easily obtained from the Auction House if not random loot drops) and using the ravager set, then it would look like:

FB set, +2 str tome, eSoS, versus 0% fort and 0 DR
Class used (pure)	fighter	fighter	barb	barb
Style of attack used	twitch	autoatt	twitch	autoatt
main hit damage/swing	198.44	198.44	218.55	218.55
glancing damage/swing	0	33.40	0	56.86
total damage per swing	198.44	231.84	218.55	275.41
swings per minute	138.38	112.31	114.77	95.16
damage per second	457.65	433.96	418.04	436.79

By losing the 1 strength, the fighter only has 49 strength, meaning his strength damage modifier goes down from 30 to 28, decreasing his DPS. In this scenario then, the fighter's DPS advantage over the barbarian is 4.8%.

So the actual DPS advantage will depend sensitively on the specific gear setup (in terms of strength tomes) and the luck of the particular character. But generally, it's around 5%, which is why I used that figure.


DPS against 50% fort:
So the above result was that fighters who twitch will have about a 5% DPS increase over barbarians using the epic Sword of Shadow against targets with 0% fort (and when they don't have aggro, due to the sneak attack from Tharne's). Let's see what happens when they go up against a monster with 50% fort.

In general, monsters won't have fortification. The most likely situation where you will encounter a monster with 50% fortification is against devil raid bosses, such as Arraetrikos in Shroud. Such monsters will also have DR 15/silver and good (on normal) as well as acid resistance, meaning they take that much damage from your physical attacks (including glancing blows) if the DR isn't bypassed. So when looking at 50% fort, those things should be considered as well.

What fortification does is to reduce the number of critical hits. When you critical hit, if the target has fortification, then there is an additional roll to see if you are able to bypass their fortification. If you roll above their fortification amount, then your critical hit goes through. If you roll below it, then you do a regular hit instead (crit-dependent effects such as acid burst may still go off, however, on such a resisted crit). This is why you should always have a heavy fort item, so that monsters do not crit on you and double or triple their damage, often leading to an instant death.

So to calculate the effects of 50% fort, the critical range is effectively halved. When using the epic Sword of Shadow, you will also likely not bypass the target's DR (unless you have the devil's ruin augment, but I'll assume that's fairly rare), so each hit and glancing blow will also do 15 less damage. Taking all this in and repeating the above calculations, the average main hit damage for a fighter is:

main hit average damage + main hit additional damage
(1*0 + 15.5*(93.5-15) + 3.5*(107.5*3-15)) = 114.65 main hit main damage
0.95 * (8/2 + 1 + 6.5) = 10.925 additional damage (note how the 8 sneak attack damage is halved due to 50% fort)
=> main hit average damage = (114.65 + 10.925) * 1.1 doublestrike = 138.13 damage per swing

The glancing blow is largely unchanged, except for that it is also affected by 15 DR, and so the damage is:

(47.875 - 15) * 0.95 * 0.75 = 23.42 average glancing blow damage per swing

You can repeat the same for the barbarian, to arrive at the following table:

Ravager set, +3 str tome, eSoS, versus 50% fort and 15 DR
Class used (pure)	fighter	fighter	barb	barb
Style of attack used	twitch	autoatt	twitch	autoatt
main hit damage/swing	138.13	138.13	153.93	153.93
glancing damage/swing	0	23.42	0	46.17
total damage per swing	138.13	161.56	153.93	200.10
swings per minute	138.38	112.31	114.77	95.16
damage per second	318.57	302.40	294.43	317.35

As you can see, fighters and barbarians are effectively tied with +3 strength tomes and the ravager set (where fighters have an even strength score and thus hold the advantage). With +4 strength tomes and the FB set, then it's:

FB set, +4 str tome, eSoS, versus 50% fort and 15 DR
Class used (pure)	fighter	fighter	barb	barb
Style of attack used	twitch	autoatt	twitch	autoatt
main hit damage/swing	134.20	134.20	154.75	154.75
glancing damage/swing	0	23.44	0	47.38
damage per swing	134.20	157.64	154.75	202.13
swings per minute	138.38	112.31	114.77	95.16
damage per second	309.50	295.08	296.00	320.58

Barbarians would hold a slight advantage, although they are effectively tied with a fighter with ravager's set and +3 tome. You can see how who does more DPS depends on your assumption of strength tomes (i.e. whichever one has the even strength score will win, because an odd stat will be wasted for the other character).

What you can see is that the introduction of 15 DR and 50% fort means that the crits from the main hit become less effective (with fighters losing 32% of their main hit damage and barbarians losing 30% of their main hit damage). However, the barbarian glancing blows lose less (19% of its damage) than the fighter glancing blows (31%) because a sizable component of it is the frenzy/death frenzy damage (the only reason why glancing blows lost damage is due to DR by the way, since it is not affected by fortification as it does not have crits nor sneak attacks). Since it is better to auto-attack for the barbarian, overall (main hit + glancing blows), he loses on average 27% of his overall damage with 15 DR and 50% fort. For the fighter, however, he loses 32% of his overall damage. Thus, the fighter has to have perfect twitch just to maintain parity with the barbarian (otherwise he loses 5% of his DPS compared with the barbarian), when using the eSoS against 50% fort and 15 DR.

But as mentioned above, monsters (generally, devil bosses) with 50% fort will have 15 DR on normal. If you ever do Shroud or VoD or ToD on hard or elite, the raid boss DR increases, up to 25 DR on hard and 35 DR on elite. In those cases, you will want to be using a weapon that can bypass DR entirely, which will generally mean a mineral 2 green steel weapon. Since we are assuming the fighter is using an epic Sword of Shadow, I'll calculate using a green steel greatsword. The calculations are the same as above except for the following changes:

* weapon dice goes from the original 17.5 to 10.5
* weapon enhancement goes from the original 10 to 5
* additional (magical) damage gets an additional 7 due to the holy effect, and an additional 2.5 due to the slicing effect
* crit range goes from 6 (rolls of 15-20) to 4 (rolls of 17-20)
* crit multiplier goes from 3 to 2

As you can see, once the characters switch off of using the eSoS, the damage goes down considerably. Furthermore, the crits also decrease significantly (both in terms of the crit range and crit multiplier). This will have a large effect below.

If you make the above changes and repeat the calculations, you will get the following chart:

Ravager set, +3 str tome, min2 greatsword, versus 50% fort and 0 DR (bypassed)
Class used (pure)	fighter	fighter	barb	barb
Style of attack used	twitch	autoatt	twitch	autoatt
main hit damage/swing	122.17	122.17	142.20	142.20
glancing damage/swing	0	30.85	0	53.08
total damage per swing	122.17	153.02	142.20	195.28
swings per minute	138.38	112.31	114.77	95.16
damage per second	281.75	286.43	272.00	309.71

Now, the barbarian has an 8.1% DPS advantage over the fighter (and remember, this setup gives fighters the advantage due to even/odd strength scores). What's more, notice that it is now better for the fighter to auto-attack rather than to twitch.

What's happening is that when using the eSoS, the wide crit range and crit multiplier and 0% fort (along with magical effects and doublestrike) make the main hit do 202.07 damage per swing, which is 216% of the original base damage of 93.5 for the fighter. Once the fighter is forced off of the eSoS due to having to bypass DR for harder raid difficulties, the mineral 2 main hit only does 122.17 damage per swing, which is 150% of the original base damage of 81.5. However, glancing blows do 30.85 damage, which is 37.9% of the base damage. Similarly for the eSoS, glancing blows were 36.5% of the base damage.

Twitch relies on having more (quicker) main hit attacks at the expense of losing glancing blow damage. Because of this, it is worthwhile to twitch only when the amount of increased attacks outweigh the decrease in damage per attack (i.e. per swing). In other words, it is only worthwhile to twitch when the glancing blow damage is below a certain percentage of the main hit damage, which is based on the amount of increased attacks. In the original eSoS case, where glancing blows make up 14% of a fighter's overall damage, it made sense to get 23% more hits at the expense of losing 14% damage per hit. In the mineral 2 case, however, glancing blows make up 20.2% of a fighter's damage, and 23% more hits do not offset this, since (100% - 20.2%) * (100% + 23.2%) = 98.4%. In other words, the fighter loses 1.6% DPS by twitching, which is what you can see in the chart above.

For the barbarian, because the capstone increases the glancing blow damage and because frenzy/death frenzy proc on all (successful) glancing blows, the glancing blow damage is almost always above that threshold, and therefore it is almost always better to auto-attack instead of twitch. For the fighter, the situation is not so clear-cut, as you can see in the situations above; this is why, as I said in the previous post, to play a fighter and maximize your DPS, you also have to know when to twitch and when to not twitch.

Therefore, it is easier to play as a barbarian, especially in raids; you just need to make sure you're tabbed on the right target (i.e. raid boss) and have auto-attack on, and then frenzy/death frenzy every minute and you can go grab a drink, surf the web, etc., in the remaining 50+seconds per minute until the raid is done (you also have to re-rage every 4 minutes or so but that's usually not a concern since a fighter will usually run out of haste boosts soon after that anyway and they say fights don't last that long). As a fighter, you will have to evaluate whether or not to twitch, you will have to twitch perfectly when it's better to twitch, position yourself properly while twitching, and manage different clickies with different cooldowns, to have that minor DPS advantage over a barbarian, and that's only valid for certain situations (as barbarians will have more DPS than a fighter in other situations). In situations where the barbarian can't go grab a drink but actually have to be at the keyboard (i.e. because the fight situation is still continually changing), he can focus on understanding the situation at hand and maintaining situational awareness (i.e. focusing on the same monster that the rest of the group is focusing on, peeling monsters away from the healer/caster if they start chasing the squishies, etc.) since there's not much upkeep for the class, while the fighter has to be able to do the same thing yet still trying to twitch and maintain cooldowns, etc. This is why I said if you're learning how to play a melee and still learning how to read and react to such situations, barbarians will be easier to handle.

Given all the above, I will be curious to see how you justify saying that a barbarian's DPS is "much lower" than a fighter at around 10%, especially keeping in mind that using a setup favoring fighters the barbarian does 8.1% more DPS against (non-normal difficulty) raid bosses. The only situation where a fighter has a definite advantage over a barbarian is in auto-crit situations (epics), but in those cases, I'm not convinced that a THF is the best thing to have around anyway (I would lean toward a pure rogue for that, due to the TWF sneak attacks, although I haven't done the calculations yet). Would you like to post your justification for those numbers?

Practice makes perfect. Position also makes perfect.

They are also investments into the character, since a THFer will have to take time to learn how to twitch. A barbarian can make that investment much later (not to mention, spend more time learning how to play a melee) compared with a fighter. A fighter will be more pressured into making that investment early on in order to maximize DPS, giving more stress for someone who's learning how to play a melee.

For example Shrouds has a few situations in which twitching is difficult but can be fixed.

There are situations for twitch, but Shroud is one of the worst situations to twitch.

Portals - standing in the middle of everyone makes it hard to see your swords vertical drop making you guess the timing. Instead standing at 90 degrees to the normal of the portal and hitting the sides means no one is in your way.

Since they removed glancing blows while twitching in Update 5 back in June 2010, it has been a terrible idea to twitch against portals, especially with the improvements to glancing blow in Update 7. Portals have 100% fort, meaning that you are effectively doing base damage against them (plus magical damage), and your main hit damage is pretty low. This means that relatively speaking, your glancing damage will be higher (although the specific amount will depend on your weapon since the portal has 10 DR, unbypassable), and so it is hard to justify increasing your main hit attack rate at the expense of losing glancing blows. The damage against a portal (assuming eSoS) looks something like this:

Ravager set, +3 str tome, eSoS, versus 100% fort and 10 DR
Class used (pure)	fighter	fighter	barb	barb
Style of attack used	twitch	autoatt	twitch	autoatt
main hit damage/swing	88.30	88.30	102.13	102.13
glancing damage/swing	0	26.29	0	48.81
total damage per swing	88.30	114.59	102.13	150.93
swings per minute	138.38	112.31	114.77	95.16
damage per second	203.65	214.50	195.34	239.38

The fighter loses 5% of his DPS by twitching instead of auto-attacking. Furthermore, as with high-fort situations, the barbarian holds a 12% DPS advantage over the fighter by just standing there auto-attacking. Either way, neither of them should be twitching.

CC and trash - if you're in the middle it can be difficult to see what you're doing, however you're twitching so you can easily move to the outside of the mobs. Twitching with a vorpal in a PUG will mean you easily out kill the rest of the melee as well, often more than doubling their kills.

If you're doing Shroud normal as a THF, there's a pretty good chance that for the trash, you should actually be using your DPS weapon rather than hurting your DPS by using vorpals, since they don't have much HP anyway. THFers decrease their DPS by using a vorpal but get only one vorpal attempt per swing; TWFers do the same but will get close to two vorpals per swing. By comparative advantage, there's a good chance that to kill efficiently, a THFer should just take out a DPS weapon and try to finish off nearly-dead monsters in the pack so that the TWFers can work on vorpaling healthy monsters instead (which would increase the group's overall kill speed). But anyway, given that when all is accounted for, TWFers (without tempest or doublestrike) will get around 1.5x more vorpal attempts than a THFer who is twitching, if you are doubling kills over PUGs by THF twitch vorpaling it is a sign of bad PUGs, not good twitching. If you really want to up your vorpal count I imagine the best way is to jump into the middle of the mob pack and spam supreme cleave, since it only has a 1-second (or so) cooldown. I would be curious to know if quickdraw decreases the time on it but too lazy to go test it out.

Harry - Harry is the hardest to twitch on imo, if a wing covers you you're going to miss a swing, however it is easier to twitch to the side than it is to twitch forwards into Harry, while you move away from the wings. Once someone else or you has agro you don't have the wings getting in the way and there is no problem.

The problem with this is that Harry is the part of the raid where it is the most important to have good, consistent DPS. The fighter has to be able to maintain good twitch or lose 5% of his DPS (by auto-attacking instead), while the barbarian just standing there auto-attacking will have the same DPS as the fighter with perfect twitch. That during the fight, there will also be multiple groupmates (potentially blocking your avatar), possibly a turned Harry (wing blocking your avatar) or enlarged Harry and blades coming in (both also potentially blocking your avatar), and spell effects going off (potentially blocking your avatar, creating sound effects if you were relying on sound to time your twitch because your avatar is so often blocked, and also causing lag depending on your computer), makes it a very difficult environment to have spreadsheet-perfect twitch and showcases the differences between spreadsheet assumptions and actual practice.

In general, twitch is still useful for certain situations but it isn't a panacea for THF DPS, and Shroud is definitely not a good place to try to twitch. The only place I'd likely twitch in Shroud is in part 2 depending on the mini-bosses, but that part is not very DPS-dependent (it's more dependent on group coordination) and so maximizing your DPS isn't a big concern anyway. Maybe part 5 on the mini-bosses as well.

[Emili]

Clarification needed: Are you asking what percentage of time is spent killing epic trash compared to bosses? Or are you asking what percentage of effort and risk is spent killing epic trash compared to bosses?

There is a difference.

I am in no-way endorsing or siding with Consumer's build here. To be straight.

... but I will go on record that when I'm on my fighter in a high DPS group (and I am not tanking) I actually lower her HP ro sport more DPS items (just would like some eMaralith and an eDuskheart to go with it ).

Even Matt, Clean and other creame of Khyber melee within conversations have touted most melee geared up need not sport shroud HP items these days.

There is a very logical reason for this all.

Once you enter a realm where four or more DPS builds are pushing way past 500dps each the end fights lasts but a minute or sometimes less - Yes, I seen Horoth go down in under a Kensie surge boost before... Yes far cry from when I was a sole Kensie only booted person in party beggin' for others to chance comming in and spank on his behind. Typically party make-up and the gear level of the party have me assertain the way I may need to play. Sometimes I call it correct and once in a while am wrong... Emili had 100 ToD completes before I TR'd her lost count afters and I'd wager a good 40% of those I was stuck in tank position, I've seen many a ToD including elites and many epics and while HP is nice as buffer ... I also seen 1000hp barbs bite the dust in places you'd not think. HP is not a guarentee nor is it neccessarily "Win". For that matter neither is total all out DPS ... a DPS toon in a low DPS group may be akin a bloody bullseye in the mob's eye.

[Cetus]

I am in no-way endorsing or siding with Consumer's build here. To be straight.

... but I will go on record that when I'm on my fighter in a high DPS group (and I am not tanking) I actually lower her HP ro sport more DPS items (just would like some eMaralith and an eDuskheart to go with it ).

Even Matt, Clean and other creame of Khyber melee within conversations have touted most melee geared up need not sport shroud HP items these days.

There is a very logical reason for this all.

Once you enter a realm where four or more DPS builds are pushing way past 500dps each the end fights lasts but a minute or sometimes less - Yes, I seen Horoth go down in under a Kensie surge boost before... Yes far cry from when I was a sole Kensie only booted person in party beggin' for others to chance comming in and spank on his behind. Typically party make-up and the gear level of the party have me assertain the way I may need to play. Sometimes I call it correct and once in a while am wrong... Emili had 100 ToD completes before I TR'd her lost count afters and I'd wager a good 40% of those I was stuck in tank position, I've seen many a ToD including elites and many epics and while HP is nice as buffer ... I also seen 1000hp barbs bite the dust in places you'd not think. HP is not a guarentee nor is it neccessarily "Win". For that matter neither is total all out DPS ... a DPS toon in a low DPS group may be akin a bloody bullseye in the mob's eye.

And to piggy back on this post, when not main tanking I am wearing absolutely no greensteel items in my entire gear setup since I want the tharnes SA dmg, Subtract an additional 45hp off of an already low hp build and it becomes troublesome as well.

[PopeJual]

Feats that I think are better than off-label Fighter DPS feats.

If you start with a basic Kensai III Fighter, you'll want at least the basics. I'll go with a TWF Fighter, but just replace the TWF feats with THF feats if you want to go THF and things stay mostly the same.

Weapon Focus - slash OR pierce
Greater Weapon Focus - same
Superior Weapon Focus - same
Weapon Specialization - same
Greater Weapon Specialization - same
Power Critical (just kidding)
TWF
ITWF
GTWF
Stunning Blow
Quick Draw
Toughness (because everyone should at least try to find room for Toughness)

That's 12 feats. All of them except for Toughness can be taken as Fighter feats. That leaves 6 more feats for your divisible-by-three levels (plus 1 more for Human if you go that route).

I'd pick
Khopesh (if you go the Slashing route)
Improved Trip
Sap
Skill Focus: Intimidate OR UMD (depending on where you want to spend your skill points)
Bull Headed
Another Toughness
and I'd go for Improved Critical: Bludgeoning if you *really* need to show some love to those Skeletons and Liches.

Picking up the entire extra line of THF/TWF and Weapon Focus/Weapon Specialization lines for a Fighter is just wasting feats. If you're going to waste feats, please at least waste them on something interesting.